The Mac is Back--0n the campaign trail with John McCain

A carload of us headed for the Nationwide Arena this afternoon to see John McCain, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Hank Williams, Jr., plus a number of local and Ohio politicians. It was great fun and great weather. We chatted with a lot of people in line, and then in the seating area. Joe the Plumber actually had his own line of people and seating area. There were cheerleaders, a choir from a local school, someone from the German government (we were admiring his clothes), and a stunning number of young people. At first we didn't think the crowd was very large--maybe 10,000, then by 5:30 when the work day ended, we saw a huge influx of people. The woman in front of me kept holding up her sing, "Homeschoolers for McCain" so I couldn't actually see John McCain when he was speaking, but that was the only negative.

The driver of the car was both a WWII and a Korean War veteran. Betcha there aren't many of those at an Obama gathering. When John McCain asked for a show of hands of veterans so he could thank them, I told Marv to raise both arms. He had enlisted while still in high school, and when the war was over, went back to school and worked nights. Then he was in college when he was called up as a reservist for Korea. I wonder if kids at Obama rallies can fathom that sort of responsible behavior since Obama believes in running out on your allies.

Arnold's best line was, "John McCain spent more time in a POW prison than Obama has spent in the Senate." Big cheers. It speaks to experience and to . . . experience.

While we were waiting in line to get into Nationwide, the man next to us wearing a "Veterans for McCain" button said he'd been in the Air Force from 1955 to 1985--30 years. I wonder how many Obama rallies had 30 year military veterans. People who know the cost of security and freedom.

Then there was some silly stuff too. I chatted a bit with the 3 women in front of me. One crossed the line and went over to hug a man in another line who looked a little startled. I jokingly said to the other two, "I hope she knows that guy." "No, she probably doesn't, said the one. "She does that all the time."

Update: One of the Ohio bloggers has put up a video. Here's the link. It's been a long campaign; many urgent issues were not addressed at all that are of major concern to conservatives. Only the back and forth ads. The economy crunch in September blew everything out of the water, and Democrats could have had that fixed by getting down to business 18 months ago. We all saw it coming (although O'Reilly says he didn't), but for some crazy reason (I guess because we retirees are so rich), Obama ran with the pointed finger, none of somehow aimed at his buddies. Go figure. The man is a political genius and a moral failure. Anyway, enjoy the video--it's well worth watching again--Arnold is much more specific than McCain, although for that Californian to talk down socialism--that's a little stretch!

Another Obama relative surfaces

Christians who think the government should be doing the Matthew 25 routine instead of the tithe and time, should note that the Bible also has a few things to say about taking care of ones family first.

The British newspaper The Times reported Wednesday that it had tracked down Barack Obama’s aunt Zeituni Onyango. Although born in Kenya, Onyango now lives in the United States, in Boston. The report of The Times shows her living conditions are not exactly grand.

Zeituni Onyango is affectionally described by Obama in his book Dreams from My Father. Today, however, it seems that Obama and Onyango have little to no contact. The latter now ‘lives in a disabled-access flat on a rundown public housing estate in South Boston.’

Another relative of Obama, whom he also affectionally described in his best-selling autobiography, also lives in Boston, in even worse circumstances than Zeituni. Uncle Omar, as the uncle is called by Obama in his book, ‘was beaten by armed robbers with a “sawed-off rifle” while working in a corner shop in the Dorchester area of the city. He was later evicted from his one-bedroom flat for failing to pay $2,324.20 (£1,488) arrears, according to the Boston Housing Court.’

As The Times pointed out in its report, ‘the US press has repeatedly rehearsed Mr Obama’s extraordinary odyssey, but the other side of the family’s American experience has only been revealed in parts. Just across town from where Mr Obama made history as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, some of his closest blood relatives have confronted the harshness of immigrant life in America.’

Aunt Zeituni indicated that she was willing to talk about Barack, but only after the November 4 election. “I can’t talk about it, I just pray for him, that’s all,” she said, adding: “After the 4th, I can talk to anyone.” Times OnLine, because of course, U.S. papers can't talk either.

Poor Auntie Zeituni. Doesn't want to be plunged like Joe the Plumber! Wonder what the pay off is if she keeps quiet?

summary here

Friday Family Photo

This is a really terrible polaroid shot--wasn't even good when it was new. I think my father-in-law was just learning how to use it and didn't get the preservative fluid on it right--remember you had to smear it with something? This was taken at my in-laws' ranch style home on Mitchner on the east side of Indianapolis. They had moved there in 1957, and in order to finish at Arsenal Technical High School in the city, my husband listed his address as his aunt Bert's--the other half of the double they had lived in for about 15 years. And the furniture! I still remember the bright red couch with lime green accessories, step end tables and those funny lamps. One looks like a flying saucer about to land, the other like a strangled boa constrictor. That huge old TV with rabbit ears--wow! Did my parents even own one? Their decor was so much more modern than my own parents' style, that I'm sure I was impressed. My father-in-law worked for RCA and they had had a TV since the late 1940s. I wore that outfit, which was new then, for years--black and white wool tweed with black leather trim.

This photo is so tiny I had to see it on the computer screen before I realized that we still have the coffee grinder that's sitting on the end table. I knew it was from their home, but didn't know its age. Now I know it is at least 45 years old.

What you don't see here is our struggle to smile. Our only child had died about two months before, so this may have been one of our first ventures back into normalcy by attending a family function, perhaps Easter, but I noted only the year on the back of the photo.

Where Obama gets his TV ads

According to this writer,

from thin air

by deleting phrases from actual sentences

by forgetting the ellipsis and adding a period

by being deliberately dishonest.

Obama and Racism

There are so many political and moral reasons to fight Obama's fight to claim our White House, I'm always surprised (not really) when he and his supporters claim racism will be at the root if he fails. Indeed, it's the racism of the left that has pushed him this far. The leftist racism is essential to keep African Americans down so Obama has a podium on which to stand and preach to the rest of us.

• Racism that destroys the black family by pushing the father out of the home.
  
• Racism that destroys the drive and initiative that sustained African Americans during the darkest days of slavery and Jim Crow days with trillions in government handouts.
  
• Racism that strangles job growth and development with the new next best thing on their agenda, global warming (liberals have short attention spans).
  
• Racism that killed more black Africans by removing DDT from the international market in the 20th century than all the transatlantic slave trade with Arab Africans in the 17th and 18th centuries.
  
• Racism that puts government sponsored church "social justice" programing above Biblical righteousness and justice.
  
• Racism that shuts its eyes to the denigration of black women in hip hop and entertainment industries owned by white liberals.
  
• Racism inherent in the high abortion rate of black babies and the location of Planned Parenthood clinics near black neighborhoods.
  
• Racism that would keep black children from school choice while white liberals, civil rights leaders and our members of Congress send their little darlings to private schools.
  
• Racism that ignores the immigration of the African families who have come here for economic and religious freedom, more than ever came as slaves.
  
• Racism, if it exists in this campaign, is swamped by the sexism and ageism against Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin and John McCain.

This morning on CBS I saw a Halloween costume look-alike contest of "Palins" with wigs and jackets and glasses. Some extremely unflattering, but getting great guffaws and cheers. Imagine someone doing an Obama look alike contest in black face for Halloween on a major network!

Digital Repositories

Digital Repositories or digital suppositories.
Is it just me and my need to rhyme?
To poke fun, or just poke all the time?
Or is it the experience I've had
with these library-wanna-be's bad
that just take a dump and have no class
order or sense up their ass pass
just all half-digested, and plain
with nary a librarian to ease the pain.

Digital Repositories--what is it? Your guess is as good as mine.

A librarian has taken offense at my language. That's a hoot (223:1 liberal to conservative). Probably has also objected to filters on the library's computers that protect children and has decided to be a hypocrite. Anyway, for that hypervigilant liberal, I've found a new word to rhyme with "class," that will convey the passage of undigested matter to the posterior opening of the alimentary canal.

Karyn Gillette, Jennifer Brunner, and ACORN

We were naive, I suppose, to hope our Democratic Secretary of State was a solo performer in this Ohio voter fraud. I was on one of her juries a few years back, and found her quite charming and knowledgeable, although I lost some faith in the jury of peers idea. Now it seems the noise is from a trio composed of her, ACORN, and her campaign consultant, Karyn Gillette. John Fund, writer for the Wall St. Journal, writes about this on October 30 link

"But Ms. Gillette certainly deserves more scrutiny. In 2006, she was a campaign consultant for Jennifer Brunner, the Acorn-backed Democratic candidate for Ohio secretary of state. Since her election, Ms. Brunner has outraged Republicans and left many objective observers puzzled by her judgment calls.

Some 660,000 new voter registrations have been filed in Ohio this year by groups including Acorn, and more than 200,000 failed a "match up" test in which voter information was compared with driver's license and Social Security databases. Despite these warning signs, Ms. Brunner refused to allow county officials access to information they needed to verify the newly registered voters. Many of the new registrants cast ballots earlier this month in Ohio's "Golden Week," a seven-day period when state residents can register and immediately cast an absentee ballot. At least half a dozen cases have been documented of people illegally registering and casting ballots during "Golden Week."

Republicans seeking to force Secretary Brunner to surrender the data have been stymied in court, but their hand may be strengthened by the latest revelation that Ms. Brunner's campaign consultant has close ties with Acorn's Project Vote and has been accused under oath of obtaining donor lists from the Obama campaign to drum up dollars for Acorn's voter registration effort -- including its large Ohio operation."

In yesterday's Wall Street Journal John Fund tracks Obama's ties (chains and bondage) to ACORN

The FBI is investigating its voter registration efforts in several states, amid allegations that almost a third of the 1.3 million cards it turned in are invalid. And yesterday, a former employee of Acorn testified in a Pennsylvania state court that the group's quality-control efforts were "minimal or nonexistent" and largely window dressing. Anita MonCrief also says that Acorn was given lists of potential donors by several Democratic presidential campaigns, including that of Barack Obama, to troll for contributions.

The Obama campaign denies it "has any ties" to Acorn, but Mr. Obama's ties are extensive. In 1992 he headed a registration effort for Project Vote, an Acorn partner at the time. He did so well that he was made a top trainer for Acorn's Chicago conferences. In 1995, he represented Acorn in a key case upholding the constitutionality of the new Motor Voter Act -- the first law passed by the Clinton administration -- which created the mandated, nationwide postcard voter registration system that Acorn workers are using to flood election offices with bogus registrations. Link

It's probably too late in the campaign to do much--God knows if Obama wins, all investigations of the illegal and immoral "community organizer" leftists will stop. ACORN created him; he won't toss them under the bus like Grandma.

HT Maggie Thurber

When Obama surges, the market falters

He didn't support the surge and victory in Iraq. Can you trust your 401-k to an Obama surge and victory?

"To state the obvious: The valuation of an individual stock reflects the collective expectation of investors about a company's future profits, dividends and appreciation, and the same is true of the market as a whole. These profits, in turn, are greatly influenced by government policy on taxes, spending, subsidies, environmental and other regulations, labor laws, and the corporate legal climate. Investors have heard enough from both candidates in the last month or two to conclude that prospects for a flourishing, competitive, growing and reasonably free economy in a McCain administration are bad, and in an Obama administration far worse. (In fact, the market's bearish behavior over the last couple of months pretty closely tracks Barack Obama's gains.)" George Newman

I've written about this too, but the Wall Street Journal has a larger readership than my blog.

Wal-Mart--will the left be happy now?

Wal-Mart will continue its international expansion. Yes, the world's largest retailer that revolutionized and streamlined the U.S. retail industry and brought about all the NIMBY activities will continue to grow. Just not here. In the U.S. Providing Americans with jobs. Especially all those industries from whom they purchased, all the private contractors from truck drivers to toy makers, to packagers. I'm assuming they'll continue to fuel China's economy; the goods will just be shipped to Brazil.

Spending on remodeling and adding new stores in the U.S. and Canada will rise only slightly to $4.8-$5.3 billion by Jan. 2010, from $4.5-$5.8. And to create this crunch in the economy, they didn't even have to wait for President Obama to take office for more environmental regulations, higher taxes on profits, more affirmative action hiring policies, more punitive health care demands, or the snooping into undocumented worker demands. They only needed to put a damp finger in the air to sense which way the wind is blowing.

Who is hurt the most? Low income and working class American families. They can't buy the low cost goods, can't get the jobs or contracts. NIMBYs used to hollar that a Wal-Mart hurt the neighborhood, but that isn't true, except in the same way hard surface roads hurt small towns as people drove 20-30 miles to the next city 70 years ago. And that happened in small towns years ago, long before shopping centers and discount houses.

Abstract: This paper estimates the effect of Wal-Mart expansion on retail employment at the county level. Using an instrumental variables approach to correct for both measurement error in entry dates and endogeneity of the timing of entry, I find that Wal-Mart entry increases retail employment by 100 jobs in the year of entry. Half of this gain disappears over the next five years as other retail establishments exit and contract, leaving a long-run statistically significant net gain of 50 jobs. Wholesale employment declines by approximately 20 jobs due to Wal-Mart's vertical integration. No spillover effect is detected in retail sectors in which Wal-Mart does not compete directly, suggesting Wal-Mart does not create agglomeration economies in retail trade at the county level. "Job Creation or Destruction? Labor Market Effects of Wal-Mart Expansion," Emek Basker, Review of Economics and Statistics, February 2005, Vol. 87, No. 1, 174-183

I noticed that Rebekah Gee, a physician and the Robert Wood Johnson Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania Medical School, and daughter of President Gee of OSU will discuss “Taking on Wal-Mart and Other Women’s Health Policy Initiatives" at OSU. She must be recovered from the terrible accident that took her husband's life and injured her this past summer. I'm of the view that if a retailer doesn't want to provide Plan B abortions, they shouldn't be required to. Gee and two other women staged a need at a Wal-Mart then brought a suit. Story here. So no woman's right was violated; no little life snuffed. At the time, Wal-Mart was required by law in Illinois to carry the abortifacient (morning after pill), but not other states. Hmm. Was Obama in the legislature when that one slipped through?

I wonder what women will do when there's no Wal-Mart to run to or it's closed? Just say No?

Wal-Mart no longer stocks my favorite face cream. Maybe I'll sue. I will have to get it mail-order otherwise. It should be my right.

Catholics end funding to ACORN over financial irregularities

Dennis Sadowski of Catholic News Service reports

"that The Catholic Campaign for Human Development suspended funding a nationwide community organizing group after it was disclosed June 2 that nearly $1 million had been embezzled.

Funding was suspended for the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, popularly known as ACORN, because of the financial irregularities, said Ralph McCloud, executive director of CCHD, the U.S. bishops' domestic anti-poverty and social justice program."

That's nice, but they should have stopped it long ago because ACORN is dangerous, bad for the poor and bad for the country. Catholics, Lutherans, Methodists, Mennonites, et al need to start examining their heart for Jesus and stop taking government money to run government programs that cozy up to marxist organizations.

"McCloud released information showing that CCHD funded more than 320 ACORN projects with grants totaling more than $7.3 million during the last 10 years. He said the community organization also had received funds since early in CCHD's history.

CCHD's Web site reveals the campaign gave about $1.11 million to 40 ACORN affiliates in 2007 and $1.17 million to 45 affiliates in 2006.

Over the years, some of the funds undoubtedly were used for voter registration drives, McCloud said."

And why did it take from June to October to suspend the funding? I'd like to be a fly on the wall. . .

How much do you know about the economy?

Every morning at the coffee shop I chat with a number of different people--blue collar, management, writers, teachers, clerks and school children. Yesterday sitting with the two Columbus school teachers who usually join me around the fire with their newspapers, I said, "At the beginning of 2005, 1.8% of non-rental homes were empty and waiting to be sold. What do you suppose it was as of yesterday (Tuesday, Oct. 28). The wife guessed 10%, the husband 50%.

The answer is 2.8%. Both of these people are well educated, parents of college students, teachers, Christians and Republicans (actually, I only know they are voting for McCain, not their party). So how could they be so far off? The media's constant negative drum beat. And the unrelenting, dishonest, lying Obama ads. Even if you don't plan to vote for him, the constant downgrading of the economy and negative view of the American people as rich racists from Team Obama takes its toll. I even get them on my blog. [into the trash they go]

Most of these house vacancies waiting for sale are in eight states, and by far most are in California and Florida. I know a family who sold their Florida home this past summer. It had been on the market 5 years ago, but was taken off after several weeks because the owners just didn't want to be bothered with keeping it up for showing--it interferred with their home business. But in 2008, when it sold in a down market, they actually sold it for more than the sale price in 2003! House prices in California and Florida were already so inflated, that even in a down market, sellers are making out just fine. Many of the foreclosures are the result of people being allowed to buy who really couldn't afford it thinking prices would continue to rise and the could refinance when the balloon popped.

My son lives in a fairly new, but very modest neighborhood in a southeast suburb of Columbus. I asked him if there are many houses for sale in his neighborhood or foreclosure signs. No, nothing different, he said. Here in Upper Arlington I see quite a few business vacancy rental signs, but other than staying on the market longer, I don't see a housing problem. There's that new ugly high rise across from the parking lot of Kingsdale, but I think that's a problem of location. An inflated view of what your home is worth in any market, any city, any state is a problem. Remember, just a few years ago, people were flipping houses in a matter of months, and owners were taking bids for more than the asking price. If you sold in that market, you probably didn't call it unfair to buyers.

The number of homes sold in Ohio rose in September, the first increase in 20 reporting periods, the Ohio Association of Realtors said today.

Sales in September totaled 10,387, up 3.5 percent from 10,036 in September 2007. The average sale price, however, fell 6.3 percent to $134,135, the group said.

Activity during September picked up significantly in several markets, notably northeastern Ohio... Columbus Dispatch

Barack Obama campaigning in Kenya with his cousin, Odinga

How elections are worked out in Kenya

Kenya has an interesting history, and until recently was fairly stable for an African country. African countries have struggled with dictatorships, regardless of the form of government, poor infrastructures, ethnic violence, and weak economies built on handouts and guilt grants from their former colonial masters, now European liberals and socialists.

According to the CIA's World Fact Book, "Founding president and liberation struggle icon Jomo KENYATTA led Kenya from independence in 1963 until his death in 1978, when President Daniel Toroitich arap MOI took power in a constitutional succession. The country was a de facto one-party state from 1969 until 1982 when the ruling Kenya African National Union (KANU) made itself the sole legal party in Kenya. MOI acceded to internal and external pressure for political liberalization in late 1991.

The ethnically fractured opposition failed to dislodge KANU from power in elections in 1992 and 1997, which were marred by violence and fraud, but were viewed as having generally reflected the will of the Kenyan people. President MOI stepped down in December 2002 following fair and peaceful elections. Mwai KIBAKI, running as the candidate of the multiethnic, united opposition group, the National Rainbow Coalition (NARC), defeated KANU candidate Uhuru KENYATTA and assumed the presidency following a campaign centered on an anticorruption platform. KIBAKI's NARC coalition splintered in 2005 over the constitutional review process. Government defectors joined with KANU to form a new opposition coalition, the Orange Democratic Movement, which defeated the government's draft constitution in a popular referendum in November 2005.

KIBAKI's reelection in December 2007 brought charges of vote rigging from ODM candidate Raila ODINGA and unleashed two months of violence in which as many as 1,500people died. UN-sponsored talks in late February produced a powersharing accord bringing ODINGA into the government in the restored position of prime minister."

Raila Odinga is Barack Obama's cousin (in our system it would be first cousins according to Odinga, but others say they are just members of the same Luo clan). Odinga is a Marxist and named his first child Fidel Castro.

Mr. Odinga told a stunned BBC Radio interviewer the reason why he and Mr. Obama were staying in near daily telephone contact was because they were cousins. In a Jan. 8, 2008, interview, Mr. Odinga said Mr. Obama had called him twice the day before while campaigning in the New Hampshire primary before adding, "Barack Obama's father is my maternal uncle." Obama’s Kenya Ghosts

Odinga ran on a platform of Change and was apparently a very sore loser (close race). That's not an unusual campaign slogan, but a U.S. Senator giving money to a foreigner, even his own cousin, to run a campaign is at best unwise, and at worst, illegal. Then that same Senator taking money from foreigners to supply his grandiose campaign, is not the lend lease or foreign aid plan we Americans are accustomed to.

Watch the second video; the first has been pulled, so I don't know how long the second will be up. Here's another one covering his trip to Kenya and his interference in their election.

Wardrobe expenses for Obama

How much for that empty suit?
Or that camouflaged uniform?
The emperor's new clothes?
The magic boots to be invincible?
The glass slipper that doesn't fit?
The flag pin.
Put away the calculator.
You can never count the costs.

Democrat from NY fired for her fraud problems in Ohio

According to the Times Herald Records, Amy Little was fired by Congressman John Hall (D-Dover Plains, NY) after he learned she is/was embroiled in voter fraud investigations in Ohio. She was one of his long-time campaign advisers.

NEW PALTZ — Congressman John Hall (D-Dover Plains) fired one of his long-time campaign advisers Tuesday, after learning that she’s embroiled in voter fraud investigations in Ohio.

Amy Little, 49, has been a registered Democrat in New York since 1991, and Ulster County election officials said she voted in the party primary here in February.

But in October, Little registered to vote in Ohio. On her registration paperwork, she indicated she moved from her home at 142 Guilford Schoolhouse Road in New Paltz to a place at 1979 N. 4th St. in Columbus, near Ohio State University.

That Ohio address also doubles as headquarters for a grassroots get-out-the-vote group called Vote Today Ohio. The organization’s pro-Obama Web site says it targets “young people from campus/urban centers” and drives them to early voting sights in Ohio. The group also offers housing to out-of-town members.

Franklin County Board of Elections officials said four people, including Little, registered from Vote Today Ohio’s address in October, just before the state’s deadline. Little requested an absentee ballot, which election officials said she has submitted.

According to Ohio election laws, voters must reside in the state at least 30 days prior to the election and must intend to stay there after November.

She claims she lives in Ohio now, a fact I think she should have told her NY boss, just in case he wanted to keep his money circulating among New York Democrats. I know a lot of Columbus people who keep summer homes elsewhere, but not too many people keep winter homes in Columbus and live in other states. With our weather, that would be crazy. I thought most of the people caught here were "kids" i.e. early 20s going to school in Europe as "scholars," but apparently they needed a housemother and Nanny Little fit the bill. If she's just a consultant she's probably not eligible for unemployment to be extended and extended--you know, that economy thing? Wonder what the Obama people in the ACORN front group were paying her? It's not cheap to maintain a second residence.

HT Maggie Thurber

Steel in his spine ad

Wow. Talk about taking a phrase out of context! The latest Obama ad trying to shave the rough edges of Biden's 2 speeches in which he warns the American people (via an Obama friendly audience) that there will be hell to pay if Obama is elected (I'm paraphrasing here, he actually said an international, generated crisis to test him) is a masterpiece of obfuscation, speechifying and scare tactics. He's obviously not talking about the Republicans creating a crisis--we can't even find McCain yard signs around here and we're supposed to be a critical state.

Let's see what others say about steel. Here's one I fell into today while researching "track two diplomacy."

“Afghanistan and the Afghan people are ready to assist the United State to stabilize Afghanistan and re-build it into a progressive state, only if the United States does not display weakening of resolve in this direction and stops exploring dangerous alternatives like exit strategies and dialogue with the much Afghan-hated Taliban. The Afghan people look to USA for steely resolve in eliminating the Taliban threat to Afghanistan.” Dr. Subhash Kapila

I don't know who Dr. Kapila is, or who he's speaking to, but Obama has no steely resolve or steel in his spine (unless it's a hanger for that empty suit) except to be our first marxist president and bring the USA to its knees. No Taliban need apply--he's got it covered. The steel is all in his supporters like Bill Ayers and George Soros. Steel like in the nails in home made bombs from the Weathermen.

Biden's threat was not a gaffe (a mistake made by a politician who accidentally tells the truth). He was dead serious. Let's review.

"We're about to elect a brilliant 47-year-old senator president of the United States of America. Remember, I said it standing here, if you don't remember anything else I said: Watch, we're gonna have an international crisis, a generated crisis, to test the mettle of this guy."

Joe's known for gaffes, blurts and misremembering (like who was president in 1929, the closing of a diner in his home town, how many letters are in JOBS), but this was a prepared speech, so awful and terrifying, that after McCain brings it up in the campaign, Obamedia launches (somewhat late trying to figure out how to mop up after the spill), an ad, using only one tiny phrase of a frightening specter--a world in chaos due to the election of an untried, inexperienced, empty head in an empty suit with an empty heart, who's done nothing since getting to Washinton except run for President.

Americans, I have never been so alarmed, not by Joe Biden, but by our collective stupidity and willingness to fall down and play dead while this steam roller passes over us.

Maybe the economy is tanking in anticipation of Obama?

"The message blasted at us day after day by the Obama campaign and its public relations machine, otherwise known as mainstream media, is that we are in a recession, we have been for essentially the last eight years, and the US is unique in this because of the failed policies of George W. Bush.

We are not in recession. The economy of the last eight years has been fine. And we are doing better than our European know-it-alls who favor an Obama victory. At least that's what the most recent economic data show." Read the rest of the story, Exactly wrong again, especially the numbers.

The real story is exactly the opposite of that being told by the Obama campaign and mainstream media. The problem is lack of free markets.

• The federal register in 2004 held 78,851 pages of regulations, or the equivalent of 30 New Deals. The equivalent of almost two New Deals was added between 1999 and 2004.
  
• Sarbanes-Oxley, adding onerous new regulations on corporations designed to hopefully prevent future Enrons, was enacted in mid-2002. It didn't quite work with Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac or investment banks, did it?
  
• The first increase in the minimum wage in 10 years came in 2007; a second increase came in the summer of 2008. In May of 2007 (before the increase), the unemployment rate stood at 4.5%. The latest rate (after two minimum wage increases in two years) stands at 6.1%.
  
• The housing and financial crisis can be attributed directly to federal regulations and mismanagement at the Government Sponsored Entities of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

A mere citizen does not have legal standing to sue

U.S. Judge R. Barclay Surrick granted a motion by Barack Obama and the Democratic National Committee to dismiss a challenge to Obama's constitutional qualifications to run for President on grounds that a mere citizen does not have legal standing to sue.

Philip Berg, a Democrat and former Assistant Attorney General for Pennsylvania, brought suit alleging that under the Natural Born Citizen Clause of the U.S. Constitution, Obama is ineligible to be President.

Judge Surrick states that citizens may not sue to enforce the Constitution without statutory authorization from Congress. One question is, was Barack Hussein Obama born in Kenya, then his birth registered by his mother, a resident of Hawaii, when she returned home with him? He would still be an American citizen if born of an American mother in Kenya, but he would be ineligible to be President because his father was not a citizen. Or, is he a natural born citizen if he was adopted by his Indonesian step-father? Or if he has dual citizenship, can he be President? John McCain was not born in the United States, but both of his parents were/are U.S. citizens. His right was questioned on this basis, also. His father was in the military. However, other questions are about Obama's mother's residency, and because Hawaii wasn't yet a state (Barry Goldwater's eligibility was also a question because Arizona wasn't a state when he was born there). See Snopes. Also a 2nd law suit.

Mark Fitzgibbons writes a legal critique of Judge Surrick's ruling at
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/10/who_enforces_the_constitutions.html

The enumerated powers of the respective branches of government are set forth in the first three articles of the Constitution. Article III states that the judicial power is vested in the courts, and "shall extend to all Cases, in Law and Equity, arising under this Constitution . . ."

A case about whether a candidate is a natural born citizen seems quite clearly to arise under the Constitution, and thus within the exclusive domain of the courts. Under the language of the Constitution itself, there appears to be no need for Congress to pass a law authorizing individuals to file suit, or for courts to hear such challenges. In fact, there may be a separation of powers issue if Congress were to attempt to legislate broader or narrower access to the courts to hear constitutional challenges. That could infringe on the jurisdiction of the courts "to all Cases . . . arising under this Constitution."

Secondly, the enumerated powers of Congress under Article I do not extend to dictating who may have standing to sue under the Constitution. One may argue that Judge Surrick relied on what some believe to be the catch-all "Necessary and Proper Clause" in Article I, Section 8[18]. That authorizes Congress:

To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof.

Judge Surrick, however, never cites to that clause as his reason. Indeed, it would be inherently dangerous to our freedoms if Congress could dictate who can and cannot sue to enforce the Constitution.

I think the NYT questioned McCain's status as "natural born" which would certainly put all military, business and missionary children born abroad with a problem; I can't seem to find the Obama case or questions (there are several in his case) in NYT.

"A February NYT article raised the question as to whether McCain, who was born in 1936 on a U.S. military installation in the Panama Canal Zone, satisfied the constitutional prerequisites to become president. Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution requires a president to be a “natural born Citizen.”

“There are powerful arguments that Senator McCain or anyone else in this position is constitutionally qualified, but there is certainly no precedent,” Sarah H. Duggin, an associate professor of law at Catholic University who has studied the issue extensively, told the NYT. “It is not a slam-dunk situation.”

Maybe not. But it appears lawmakers are doing all they can to try to put the issue to rest. “It is silly for anyone to argue that Senator McCain is not eligible to become president,” said McCaskill in a written statement. “I would hope that this is something we can all agree on, for goodness sakes.”" WSJ Law Blog

Maybe the New York Times only questions the military's right to be natural born?

Via Conservative HQ

What makes Seniors tick?

That's what Harris Sherline wants to know. He has a list of questions for you at his site, The Wisdom of American's Elders, not a blog, but a website with information categories--pets, humor, challenges, etc. Stop over and take a look. He seems to be a conservative and tonight will be on a California radio show, "Is Obama ready to lead?" To listen on your computer, click this link to open a radio on your computer screen.

News you can use

Sick of talking politics at the dinner table? Tonight wow your family and/or spouse with this one:

Researchers at the University of Innsbruck, Austria and Columbia University have finally explained why ripened bananas glow blue under ultraviolet, black, light. Writing in Angewandte Chemie, Bernhard Kräutler and his colleagues report that blue hue is due to the breakdown of chlorophyll, which takes place during the ethylene-modulated ripening process of the curvy fruit. From the Alchemist Newsletter

My husband eats a banana every day. The doctor said on his last visit that he has the body of a 55 year old. Maybe you don't think that is desirable, but he is a 70 year old, born a premie, so tiny that when his head was in his mother's palm, his little toes barely reached to the crook of her elbow.

Hmm. I was over twice his weight when I was born.

The Night before the Elections

Humor, forwarded. E-mail. Author unknown. HT Maggie Thurber.

Twas the Night Before Elections
2008

'Twas the night before elections
And all through the town
Tempers were flaring
Emotions all up and down!

I, in my bathrobe
With a cat in my lap
Had cut off the TV
Tired of political crap.

When all of a sudden
There arose such a noise
I peered out of my window
Saw Obama and his boys

They had come for my wallet
They wanted my pay
To give to the others
Who had not worked a day!

He snatched up my money
And quick as a wink
Jumped back on his bandwagon
As I gagged from the stink

He then rallied his henchmen
Who were pulling his cart
I could tell they were out
To tear my country apart!

'On Fannie, on Freddie,
On Biden and Ayers!
On Acorn, On Pelosi'
He screamed at the pairs!

They took off for his cause
And as he flew out of sight
I heard him laugh at the nation
Who wouldn't stand up and fight!

So I leave you to think
On this one final note-
IF YOU DON'T WANT SOCIALISM
GET OUT AND VOTE!!!!

Note from Norma: Amadinajad probably had too many syllables.

Obama and the Courts

All courts will of course swing to the left under an Obama presidency. He has made it very clear that when he vows to uphold the Constitution as President, he will be lying. He has been absolutely consistent from his dope smoking days to the smoking of Democrat dopes in the primaries to get their votes. He believes the U.S. Constitution is at fault for not providing a socialist, marxist template for social change, that the Founding Fathers were wrong in limiting the role of government in the lives of the citizens of the newly formed country, and that the country needs to be free from unfair competition (or any competition if you read between the lines).

The last time we had three branches of the federal government marching in lock step were the Johnson and Carter years. We got the War on Poverty and the Great Society with Johnson and stagflation with Carter (high inflation, high unemployment, stagnant growth). The 1964 Civil Rights Act was a spring board for blacks into the middle class. The War on Poverty which cost trillions, however, helped create an underclass of poverty and crime that is stubbornly resistant to change but which feeds every black candidate's election coffers. Yet the Democrats have never been happy, no matter how many trillions are spent, even when Republican presidents extend the programs so they can keep their cushy jobs.

Meanwhile, our liberal policies have killed millions of unborn American citizens. Our hysteria over the potential death of a bird caused premature withdrawal of DDT from the international market (after our own swamps were cleaned up) and more Africans have died as a result of a "liberal" environmentalist testifying before Congress than were killed by the Spanish, Portuguese, French and English during the transatlantic slave trade with the Arabs in Africa.

Under liberalism, several generations of young black men have grown up in prison because we stripped them of their manhood through government handouts to their mothers and girlfriends, never expecting them to get a job or get married and take care of business. Glorification of the gay lifestyle and focus on their civil rights rather then the disease eating up and spitting out their community have helped spread horrible diseases, destroying the lives and immunity of millions of gay men.

The chickens have really come home to roost on the liberals' 1970s feel good programs of finding the American dream for all Americans, regardless of their credit-worthiness or desire to live like white folks do. All the better to push them out of their neighborhoods into suburbia making the valuable central city land available for development by capitalists, who are never shy in finding opportunities the liberals create for them. The non-profit, ACORN clones gobbled up the grant money that each succeeding administration, regardless of party, pushed through Congress for approval. Even Bush waxed eloquent with words praising the growing housing bubble--and there was money pouring in from all over the world to buy these bundled, toxic funds.

Whether you call it the New Deal, the War on Poverty, The Second Bill of Rights or the Great Society, it's just one more toxic bundle of programs which will help destroy our liberty and economy.

My Dad was a smoker--from the archives

Oh, I remember that cough. We children had never known anything else but Dad's coughing. And the blue haze everywhere in the house if he was home. In those days, I didn't find the smell unpleasant like I do now. It was always a mix of after shave, hair cream, cigarettes and fuel oil. But what must my mother have thought? Neither of her parents smoked. Her mother was a health-nut--wouldn't even eat red meat, and she was always airing out the house.

Dad told me 40 years later [after he'd quit] that he wanted a cigarette for 20 years. When I was younger, I didn't think about that too much. But now I'm in awe of his focus, drive and determination. He was not always a pleasant person to be around when I was growing up. I wonder now if he just wanted a cigarette, if his head hurt, his eyes burned and his skin crawled for nicotine. My parents weren't social--Dad dealt with people all day, 12 hours a day and a houseful of noisy children at night. And all the while, craving a cigarette, knowing that would take the edge off.

European media are much worse than ours

I might go on and on about Katie, Charlie and Chris, but visits to Germany, Finland and Italy in the past three years actually made me feel a tingle (ala Chris Matthews) for our American Media. I think I wrote that while in Finland (where you can't even figure out the street names unless they are in Swedish) I got so desperate for something to read while drinking coffee, that I actually bought a Time Magazine, about half of which covered sports. It had probably been 40 years. Germany was hopeless, as was Italy. Even if you found an "international" edition, the Bush bashing was beyond anything we see or hear (unless you can tolerate the cat littering in the Kos Kids sandbox). There is a German blog written in English on the German media bias. Not too many years ago, about 20% of Americans had German ancestry, far more than English, although that is our language. In my family tree, my German ancestors used a form of German for about 100 years, before really getting the hang of English in the early 19th century. I think that has changed, reflecting our deplorable border protection, and the tinkering done during the Great Society with our ethnic quotas.Click to enlarge

A shrill yet influential segment of the German media has repeatedly sought to exploit and exacerbate transatlantic differences. This weblog is a watchdog site dedicated to the documentation of anti-Americanism in German media and the negative influence it has on Germans’ perceptions of the United States. German media coverage of the United States is frequently marked by one-sidedness, ideology, stereotypes, clichés and factual errors Davids Medienkritik is a collection of critical postings written by those who run this blog (David and Ray) on the German media. Occasionally we also publish political postings that have no connection to any particular media organization, particularly if the topic is current and plays an important role in public discussion.

American liberals, progressives and Democrats should stop running after the European popularity vote. They don't like us, and except for a few years in the 1940s, never did. We didn't really help all that much in WWI, jumping in at the last minutes. We're always dabbling, then running away like we did in Korea and Vietnam, and like the Obamanationals wanted us to do in the middle east. I think they know that.

We are them--we are the descendants of the people who were kicked out, run off, starved out, bombed out, or sent on prison ships who built a new society where people of hundreds of ethnic groups, religions and cultures did what Europe's little city states and kingdoms were never able to do until the Euro and the threat of Islam forced them in to it--we worked together and built a country. We hung it all on a Constitution and Bill of Rights that the candidate the Europeans admire so much disrespects as being a collection of negatives, and wants to edit. Gosh, no wonder they will bow to him for a few weeks or months. He's one of them.

Payday loans--Ohio votes

Here's what I said on this topic in January. It seems to be another feel good topic for liberals, believing they will help the poor more by pushing them into more government help and away from high interest loans. One more door shut on access and choice for the poor (and the wealthy trying to hide their assets).

Our polls are very, very crowded with early voting. 51% are Democrats, 4% are Republicans, and the rest state no party preference according to the Columbus Dispatch. The Obama people have been flawless (not fraudless) in their machinations. McCain-Palin, at least in Franklin County, is not well organized and ran out of yard signs and badges some time ago (probably picked up by Obama trojan horses). As of yesterday at Vets Memorial, I think they had more absentee voters than people eligible to vote in three of our northwest suburbs--Upper Arlington, Grandview and Marble Cliff.

American Daughter recommends

"Look to Germany for extreme media bias regarding the upcoming US presidential election. Two astute German/English bloggers at Davids Medienkritik keep a watch on the German media’s commentary on the American scene. They have just documented an astounding instance of negative bias."

HT American Daughter

Once on the bandwagon, the music is too loud

Herb Denenberg invites you to look at the empty suit that is Barack Obama in this opinion piece in the Philadelphia Bulletin about major newspapers endorsing Obama. He is a former Pennsylvania Insurance Commissioner, Pennsylvania Public Utility Commissioner, and professor at the Wharton School. He is a Philadelphia journalist, consumer advocate and a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of the Sciences.

“The [Philadelphia] Inquirer criticizes Sen. John McCain for voting with President George W. Bush 90 percent of the time, but conveniently neglects to note Sen. Obama votes with his party 96 percent of the time. He is one of the most partisan and the most liberal members of the U.S. Senate. That is not the stuff of an escape from the "tar pit of partisan sniping." How can an extremist liberal, radical and party-liner bring both sides together?In fact, Sen. Obama not only lacks the ability to be bipartisan and to bring people together, but also lacks the willingness to even listen to the other side. He is not only highly partisan but seems to have a Storm Trooper mentality with a slight whiff of fascism.” . . .

“As Sen. Obama has a resume so thin and legislative achievements so non-existent, the Inquirer bases its endorsements on his positions. But even here, you see the pathetic nature of the Inquirer's efforts to fill this empty suit. . . For example, it praises Sen. McCain for his stand on public financing of elections. It omits this was central to Sen. Obama's claimed reform agenda. It omits Sen. Obama promised to take public financing. And it omits, despite his promise and pledge, as soon as it was politically expedient, Sen. Obama abandoned his pledge and promise. As usual, Sen. Obama's rhetoric is the opposite of his reality.

The Inquirer editorial also praises Sen. McCain for his stand on pork-barrel spending. . . In contrast, Sen. Obama was a leading pork-barrel spender, and even got an earmark for the medical center where his wife works. But such an outrageous conflict of interest never raised a slight stir from the mainstream media.”

[On the plus of a bi-racial president?] “. . . We don't have to tell the world that America, as a melting pot, is a reality. We are that melting pot, and we don't have to decide the election in Sen. Obama's favor to please the world or the U.N. People all over the world are fighting to get into America because they know it is the great melting pot and the golden city on the hill that is the land of opportunity and freedom. . . To put it bluntly, the Inquirer's endorsement has a definite tinge of racism, just as their favorite candidate does. In any event, the Inquirer's editorial board thinks we ought to apply affirmative action to presidential elections.”

All true, and more Mr. Denenberg, but the crowded masses are packed in the bandwagon so tightly and the music is so loud, the heart rates so high, with arms and hands raised and waving that I doubt they can hear you.

FDR's failures will be Obama's

During high school and college courses of American History that I took (I had enough for a minor in college), President Hoover was villified, Roosevelt diefied. Sort of like Bush-Obama. It's still that way in most sources. But no sensible person can look at 1932-1942 and not see that Roosevelt totally failed with his New Deal! He taxed everything that moved, particularly poor people who were taxed for the smallest pleasures like chewing gum and movie tickets. The rich did fine. Each time the stock market would start to recover or the unemployment rate would go down, he'd throw another chunk of the alphabet (AAA, NIRA, TVA, WPA, NRA) on the fire, and whoosh, he'd put out the flame of progress.

Hoover was only in office a few months when the stock market collapsed--he had no role in that at all. Unemployment was 4% in August 1929, and the crash was in October. (Somebody tell Joe Biden.) Hoover tried a little and he tried a lot. He tried free markets, tax cuts, and tax increases. He tried bailing out banks and insurance companies. Has a familiar ring?

Some of it looks just like entry level "New Deal" to me. So if it didn't work, let's try more, and that's what FDR did, and did, and did some more. We'll never know what might have happened if Hoover and Roosevelt had done nothing. Unemployment peaked in 1933, well after FDR's 100 days. Well, if you won't blame FDR for that, then don't blame Hoover for the crash. But it never got out of double digits the whole decade, and was back up around 20% in 1938. If we hadn't gone into WWII when all the men went off to war and unemployment dropped below 3% because no one was left in town but my grandfather and my great-grandfather to run things, we'd probably still be doing the New Deal. In many ways, we never quit. And each time we get a Democrat in office it's like the ghost of FDR and he tries it all over again, whether or not we have a recession or stagflation or a tech boom.

Don't trot out the WPA and wave that at me. My home town has a nice little WPA mural in the post office. We had a sweet little state park down the road where they planted trees. It's still used today--we have our class reunions there. Bright eyed, idealistic college kids can write papers about the WPA's contribution, but what the town really had were several small companies that employed people--a printing plant, a publishing company and a fulfillment agency. That's what fed people and built homes--not the government paying people an allowance to paint, write, sing, dance or build cabins in parks or roads. For the 3 million or so who were in WPA I'm sure it was a nice chance to get away from home and earn some self respect, but most people had jobs or were working the family farm, or taking in laundry or boarders, or selling garden produce.

FDR was a brilliant politician, but none of his programs turned the economy around in the Depression. It was stop-gap government sop and Obama will take us in the same direction. Thomas Sowell says

Barack Obama's "change" is a recycling of the kinds of policies and rhetoric of the New Deal that prolonged the Great Depression of the 1930s far beyond the duration of any depression before or since.

These are the same kinds of liberal policies that led to double-digit inflation, double-digit interest rates and rising unemployment during the Carter administration. These are "back to the future" changes to economic disasters that need repeating.

Make no mistake, the political rhetoric of FDR was great. For those who admire political rhetoric, as so many of Barack Obama's supporters seem to, FDR was tops. For those who go by actual results, FDR's track record was abysmal.
Thomas Sowell

What not to put in a cover letter

is the topic of Poet with a Day Job post. Good stuff. Stop and read her poetry. The Wall St. Journal today had an advice column for retirees going back to work. I noticed this one: "Hide your resentment." How you feel about the economy and your financial situation. A positive attitude goes a long way in a job interview and some of the casual questions are there to draw out your personal characteristics (that's me commenting, not WSJ, because I was on a lot of search committees).

I know people my age "laid off" at 68 or 69 who are quite bitter. Now the Obama-Biden way would be to be patriotic and spread the wealth and opportunity to the younger, poorer, less experienced person looking for work. Right?

Whatever your reason--choice or cut back--don't sit around letting your unemployment checks become a habit. When I worked for JTPA in a jobs program we told people they needed to spend 8 hours a day looking for work, updating their skills (like learning to drive or read the bus route), mailing out resumes, and networking.

The government can't do everything--yet.

The story of Cowslip

They started with three young heifers. Then

Several years later Snowdrop suddenly died. Cowslip stood next to Snowdrop's dead body refusing to leave until Snowdrop was buried. It was after Snowdrop died that we realized there was something very wrong with Cowslip. Our neighbor took one look at her and said she was blind. Then it all made sense. Snowdrop had been her eyes and without her old friend she was lost and afraid of the other cows and new places. Judging by Cowslips pale brown eyes, I'd say she been born blind." Rest of the story here at My Mustangs.

McCain Paper Dolls

My celebrity paper dolls get a lot of hits. At Illinois Review I saw an item about McCain Paper Dolls.

Eugene V. Debs, Socialist

Another Ohio Blogger suggested we google "Eugene V. Debs + Canton" for the irony in Obama's final plea to Ohioans to send him to the White House. So I looked through a Deb's speech from 90 years ago, 1918. It does have a certain flow, a ring, a familiarity, doesn't it? Except Debs was a bit more humble than Obama.

Ah! Tovarishch [Товарищ], it makes my heart sing as I march to the machine-tractor station for the motherland with the other kolkhoznitza [колхозница] and Obama's mellifluous tones in my ears.

"Socialism is a growing idea; an expanding philosophy. It is spreading over the entire face of the earth: It is as vain to resist it as it would be to arrest the sunrise on the morrow. It is coming, coming, coming all along the line. Can you not see it? If not, I advise you to consult an oculist. There is certainly something the matter with your vision. It is the mightiest movement in the history of mankind. What a privilege to serve it! I have regretted a thousand times that I can do so little for the movement that has done so much for me. The little that I am, the little that I am hoping to be, I owe to the Socialist movement. It has given me my ideas and ideals; my principles and convictions, and I would not exchange one of them for all of Rockefeller’s bloodstained dollars. It has taught me how to serve—a lesson to me of priceless value. It has taught me the ecstasy in the handclasp of a comrade. It has enabled me to hold high communion with you, and made it possible for me to take my place side by side with you in the great struggle for the better day; to multiply myself over and over again, to thrill with a fresh-born manhood; to feel life truly worthwhile; to open new avenues of vision; to spread out glorious vistas; to know that I am kin to all that throbs; to be class-conscious, and to realize that, regardless of nationality, race, creed, color or sex, every man, every woman who toils, who renders useful service, every member of the working class without an exception, is my comrade, my brother and sister—and that to serve them and their cause is the highest duty of my life."

Sarah Palin's Wardrobe

Far be it from me to say the media are going down the low road on this one--I complain about women's clothing all the time. I see women in public dressed in pajamas, sweat suits, cowboy boots, fringy-droopy 70s retro thingies, and low-cut porno outfits--and those are just the ones I see at church--you should see the ones headed for work! Both Michelle Obama and Sarah Palin have thankfully put a little class back into women's public face and rear end. (Real ladies don't say butt.) I truly hope it catches on.

Before Palin's Dayton, Ohio love fest back in late August, (view here, beginning about minute 10) I'd only seen her in casual clothes--I think she was either pregnant, or someone had turned down the heat and given her a sweater. So a black pencil skirt just a bit below the knees and short jacket fastened up to her neck looked pretty darn good, if a little schoolmarmish, and was pleasure after months and years of Hillary's pants suits and blazers and San Fran Nan busting out all over in her open front business suits below her cheery botoxed face. Sometimes she wears a red jacket, sometime pink. But she always looks good.

But I'm a woman blogger. Why shouldn't I comment on women's clothes? Why would the main stream media care what Sarah spends if they don't care what Obama or Biden spend on their tailor made suits? At home, she admits she buys at the consignment shop and about half of what the Republicans bought went back to the store either because it didn't fit or wasn't her style. I'm sure she always looks nice, but if you've got to change clothes several times a day and look good on TV (remember Nixon lost because he didn't want to wear make-up for the TV debates). I assume she's nursing Trig, and if you've ever done that, it can get messy and up the dry cleaning bills. Then there's the spit up, the diaper changing, etc. I would guess that to keep up the campaign pace she would need 8-10 outfits minimum. Then there's shoes, undergarments, jewelry, etc.

But there's always a double standard where Democrats are concerned, and the press is so deep into the dirty clothes hamper with Obama, they're getting smelly. I'm betting Nancy's pearls cost more than some of Sarah's outfits, but who's counting--certain not journalism jockeys who were so afraid Palin might have some ideas worth reporting that could get them in trouble with their editors that they decided to switch topics and go for the safe, soft news. The cost of her clothes.

The widening gap

You can't turn on the radio, TV or open a newspaper without someone talking about a gap*--and I don't mean the store where teen-agers shop. There's a poverty gap, a gender gap, a technology gap, a health care gap, yada, yada. Three and a half years ago I wrote down my reasons for the widening gap between the rich and the poor (this is actually a fabrication because people are retiring and by plan and choice reducing their household income, but let's imagine there is a gap). Let's call it The Easy Gap.

1. Easy credit cards: We got our first credit card in the late 60s--I think it was a "Shopper’s Charge." We now have one department store credit card and one bank card--we’ve never carried a balance. Since the late 80s and into the 90s, many new households have never known what it was to live on their earned income. 2. Easy divorce: Christians now have the same divorce rate as anyone else in the culture. When we married 48 years ago, regular religious observance offered families some protection. No fault divorce particularly hurt women and children, pushing them economically into competition with two income families. 3. Easy sex: Casual one-night stands were glorified in the movies of the 70s and 80s. Although adultery and fornication had long been a theme in literature, drama and movies, casual sex and living together before marriage became the gold standard of relationships by the 80s, even though it’s been proven that it increases the divorce rate. Then easy sex came into the living rooms via TV so that even young children think who’s spending the night is no more important than what toothpaste mom buys. Women having and raising babies alone is the biggest cause of growing poverty and the gap that liberals worry about. 4. Easy birth control and abortion: The millions of Americans that might have sprung from the loins of some of our best and brightest have been denied life itself, and thus their slots in the pie chart has been taken by poor, uneducated immigrants. Obviously this creates a huge gap between the middle class and the poor, who instead of having a solid footing as those aborted citizens might have had, flood across our borders or arrive as refugees with nothing. 5. Easy technology and gadgets: Time wasted on I-pods and text messaging and vegging out in front of bad movies on DVDs has certainly absorbed billions of hours that could have been invested in networking, education or advancing up the career ladder. Cable and cell phone monthly costs easily equal what we spent on a mortgage 30 years ago. 6. Easy bankruptcy: Load up the credit cards with consumer spending, mortgage your future, then make the rest of us pay it off for you. It might have been Plan B 20 years ago, but is now Plan A. Interest only mortgages, leases for larger and more expensive vehicles, second mortgages--for a generation who thinks the future will be paid for by someone else, it’s a recipe for a growing gap. 7. Easy leisure: Thirty eight years ago (1970) few middle class families took vacations--if Dad had a week off (and most companies didn’t offer it) he spent it fixing the house. Sure it’s a huge industry and employs a lot of people, but we’re looking at the gap aren’t we? We’d probably been married 10 years before we took a family vacation (my parents never had one), and then it was at my mother’s farm for a week. Our daughter and her husband had been to Key West, Arruba and took a Mexican cruise in the first 5 years of their marriage. 8. Easy entertainment: This is related to leisure and technology, but today’s young families have difficulty being alone or quiet, it would seem. Even 30 years olds seem unable to walk around without head phones. They are spending their children’s future at movies, sporting events and theme parks. A visit to the library is most likely to pick up a movie, not a book. 9. Easy college loans: Instead of attending a state school, working during the summer or attending closer to home, many young people begin their real working lives with huge debt, a debt that takes years to pay off, assuming they don’t default. Loans were so easy in the 80s, that parents who could well afford to pay tuition had their children at the public trough. 10. Easy shopping: You can be a couch potato or a computer novice and never leave home to shop. Addiction is easy. Just call in with the credit card. See? And I haven’t even said a word about how much health care costs, or how the women’s movement changed our culture, public transportation or taxes. And while the government is tangentially involved in these areas, mostly it boils down to perfectly legal choices, choices which when they become ingrained in our way of life lead to poverty or slippage down by a quintile for the next generation.

According to a google search: health care gap = 15,700; gender gap = 842,000; technology gap = 166,000; obesity gap = 417; poverty gap = 113,000.

Money to help the poor

That's probably the justification for the outrageous campaign expenditures of the Obama campaign. " Guesstimates from inside the broadcast television industry are that Barack Obam will spend $1.5 million per network -- CBS, ABC and Fox -- for Wednesday night's national 30 minute informercial. Now that's $50,000 per minute per network -- $8,333 per second per network. Altogether, $4.5 million in 30 minutes. Illinois Review"

The Democrats' idea of helping the poor is to take as much from you in the form of taxes--income, excise, death, phone, gasoline, sales, pass through (in over under around and through), VAT, etc. then pass it back to you in grants to your states, your educational institutions, your non-profits, your interstates, your transportation bailouts and subsidies, even your churches, all with handsome salaries along the way. Technically, it's a form of job creation with no product. The government doesn't create wealth, it consumes it, and sometimes uses the very people it steals from to do it. Like you. Watching the ads (never fear, Obama will make back the costs of his infomercial tomorrow night). Marking the ballot. Sitting back and waiting for the exchange and transfer of funds.

Note: I can't get the article at tv by the numbers site, but I'll keep trying. Maybe it's been pulled.

Looking for the vigilant liberals

especially librarians who were all over Bush's case for tracking down foreign terrorists by violating their privacy and freedom to bomb us. Both the state of Ohio and Ohio State have been unable to keep hackers out of our personal information (I think mine has been lost, strayed or stolen three times either on purpose or staff ineptitude--and those are the cases about which I was notified). But all that stuff about Joe the Plumber who questioned Obama's "spread the wealth" threats promises that mysteriously appeared in all the media the day after McCain mentioned him during a debate? You know, damaging information like his "real name." Well, that wasn't hacked, that was pulled by a hack and redistributed to the waiting media.

"Ohio's inspector general is investigating why a state agency director approved checking the state child-support computer system for information on "Joe the Plumber."

Helen Jones-Kelly, director of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services, confirmed today that she OK'd the check on Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher following the Oct. 15 presidential debate.

She said there were no political reasons for the check on the sudden presidential campaign fixture though the Support Enforcement Tracking System.

Amid questions from the media and others about "Joe the Plumber," Jones-Kelley said she approved a check to determine if he was current on any ordered child-support payments.

Such information was not and cannot be publicly shared, she said. It is unclear if Wurzelbacher is involved in a child-support case. Reports state that he lives alone with a 13-year-old son.

"Our practice is when someone is thrust quickly into the public spotlight, we often take a look" at them, Jones-Kelley said, citing a case where a lottery winner was found to owe past-due child support. "Our practice is to basically look at what is coming our way." " Columbus Dispatch

Now Governor Strickland, a Democrat and big time Obama supporter, yes that Ted who said he didn't give a damn about Obama's relationship with Ayers, says he is satisfied that there hasn't been any political mischief. Just like there wasn't any racism in the campaign to defeat his black Republican opponent two years ago. And there wasn't any malice intended by the 13 honor scholars from the east coast and abroad who came to Ohio to register Ohioans too dumb to figure it out by themselves. Democrats. They are so transparent it is pathetic. Was I that way when I was a Democrat all those years?

According to Open Secrets dot org, Jones-Kelley contributed $2,500 to Barack Obama in July 2008. Wow. What a surprise.

Obama behind your back

Oh sure, you're close and cozy now. Best buds. He wants your vote. By the time you realize what's going on, it will be too late. He'll have your wallet, your freedom, and your future.

Some schools succeed

Ninety eight percent graduation rate. That's impressive. Maybe it's the uniforms. My Catholic friends tell me there aren't many nuns in the classroom anymore. This letter was in today's Wall Street Journal.

Your editorial "Charter Success in L.A" (Oct. 14) overlooks the contributions of at least 40 Archdiocesan Catholic schools located within that same area. These Catholic schools serve the same population as the public schools and charter schools, yet they are achieving graduation rates of 98% and doing so at one-third the cost on a per student basis. Over 95% of these graduates are going on to two and four year colleges. For over 150 years, Catholic schools have been educating students in L.A. who go on to become leaders of integrity and competence. This is done without taxpayer funding.

Catholic schools deserve recognition for their past and continued contributions in educating civic, business and church leaders, teachers and many other professions that serve the Los Angeles community.

Kathleen Anderson
Executive Director
Catholic Education Foundation
Los Angeles

How they destroyed our economy

Remember how we all chuckled at the "community organizer" jokes at the Republican Convention? Oh, how little we knew. Now, some did, because they'd been writing, and speaking and sounding the alarm for years, but we didn't listen. The media didn't notice, they were all ga-ga over o-ba-ma and neither did the talk shows. Just a few conservative and libertarian publications and think tanks.

Remember when we thought the community organization gig was ACORN and just some voter fraud--hadn't we seen that in both parties? Gosh, in Illinois, it doesn't matter if you vote at all "down state"--Chicago will take care of it and they have enough dead people and dogs to vote in your place. JFK might have lived a long life as a Massachusetts senator if his party hadn't stolen the Illinois vote in 1960 from Richard Nixon.

Turns out it was a much bigger cancer behind the subprime loans. Here's an article from 1995, describing guerilla warfare by the community groups which eventually brought down the wealthiest country and most powerful government in the world--without firing a shot.

After a raucous Senate Banking Committee hearing exploring Fleet Financial Group's record on lending to minority communities, the Federal Reserve Board governors agreed to consider taking action against the New England banking giant. Among the community activists present at that February 1993 meeting with the governors was Bruce Marks, Director of the Boston-based Union Neighborhood Assistance Corporation (UNAC) known for waging guerrilla warfare against banks that fail to meet fair lending standards. When Marks and company returned six weeks later, only to be informed that the governors had decided not to act on the matter, the group took action of their own by rushing the front steps of the Reserve and blocking the entrance.

As the group of roughly 60 stood at the front door, a limousine pulled up, and out stepped a man resembling Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan. The protesters naturally seized upon the opportunity to make their case with the head of the Fed. They ran over and surrounded the car, overwhelming the secret service agents and the Greenspan look-alike. The man turned out to be not Greenspan but Italy's minister of finance. Although the group would have preferred a face-to-face meeting with Greenspan, mistakenly accosting the Italian finance minister was only a minor embarrassment for Marks, who regularly uses high-pressure tactics in his crusade against redlining banks.

Marks had attended the Senate Banking Committee hearing with 400 angry residents from various states, many armed with tales of injustice wrought by Fleet. The protesters, who included gospel singers and Baptist ministers, sang and chanted as they paraded in wearing bright yellow T-shirts depicting a loan shark.

"It was like a gospel revival meeting," Marks said. "I don't know if ever there's been a committee meeting where 400 people just took it over." National Housing Institute

And then skip ahead to the Winter 2000 issue of City Journal, probably written in late 1999.

There is no more important player in the CRA-inspired mortgage industry than the Boston-based Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America. Chief executive Bruce Marks has set out to become the Wal-Mart of home mortgages for lower-income households. Using churches and radio advertising to reach borrowers, he has made NACA a brand name nationwide, with offices in 21 states, and he plans to double that number within a year. With "delegated underwriting authority" from the banks, NACA itself—not the banks—determines whether a mortgage applicant is qualified, and it closes sales right in its own offices. It expects to close 5,000 mortgages next year, earning a $2,000 origination fee on each. Its annual budget exceeds $10 million.

Marks, a Scarsdale native, NYU MBA, and former Federal Reserve employee, unabashedly calls himself a "bank terrorist"—his public relations spokesman laughingly refers to him as "the shark, the predator," and the NACA newspaper is named the Avenger. They're not kidding: bankers so fear the tactically brilliant Marks for his ability to disrupt annual meetings and even target bank executives' homes that they often call him to make deals before they announce any plans that will put them in CRA's crosshairs. A $3 billion loan commitment by Nationsbank, for instance, well in advance of its announced merger with Bank of America, "was a preventive strike," says one NACA spokesman.

And here's Marks putting himself in a positive light at a "world citizenship, global humanist" blog. I wonder Mr. Marks, where are those poor and low income people you put in houses today? Do they have jobs? Do they have pensions? Where are the multitudes of employees sopping up government grants to the non-profits for paper pushers and fee takers, and hastily hammered together housing corporations to rebuild communities? Do you even care, or were they always just your route to destroy the United States economy?

Marks’ role as an aggressive crusader for reform of the powerful banking and lending industry has its representatives up in arms. On May 5, 1999 from the Senate floor, Senator Phil Gramm (R-TX), head of the Senate Banking Committee, attempted to portray banks as victims of Bruce Marks. Gramm described Marks as, “… someone who graduates from college, goes to graduate school, and goes to work for the Federal Reserve in acquisitions and mergers, quits and goes into business, spends four years harassing banks and bank presidents, and finally the bank (Fleet Bank) caves and gives them $1.4 million, gives them $200,000 to set up their organization; they now have twenty offices, lending $3.5 billion…” Senator Gramm continued, “There is a CRA protester who calls himself an “urban terrorist” who used those charges against a bank, harassed them for four years, went to a speech of the president of the bank (Fleet Bank CEO Terrence Murray) at Harvard University, disrupted the speech, made this man’s life miserable for four long years.” Bruce Marks wears this personal attack as a badge of honor.

Under Marks’ leadership, NACA has garnered commitments of over $6.7 Billion for the best mortgage product in America. NACA now has 31 offices throughout the country and will double in size within the next 12 to 18 months. NACA has become the largest housing services organization in the United States.

Community Reinvestment Act Harmful legacy

For a lefty hissy fit on the conservatives waking up to the CRA's mistakes, see here, so don't say I don't provide an alternative view, which the left never does.

Backatcha!

Instead of addressing the fraud among their volunteers, Obama's campaign has chosen to investigate the investigators who uncovered the problem. See story at Maggie Thurber. Move over Joe

Rather than address the fact that some people supportive of Obama have registered and voted incorrectly, these Obama campaign workers want to demonize the individuals who've exposed them

And then there's the on-going saga of Joe the Plumber and what a terrible threat a simple question was to the Obama Campaign after Obama told Joe he wanted to spread the wealth (something he's said many times, but not recently, and not on the campaign trail). So much so that someone thought the means justified the end, and hacked Joe's personal information.

Personal information on "Joe the Plumber" was sought through the state's child-support computer in a check run from the main offices of the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

Ohio Inspector General Thomas P. Charles confirmed today that he is investigating the incident. He declined to provide details.

The inquiry on Samuel Joseph Wurzelbacher was run through the Support Enforcement Tracking System from the state department's offices in downtown Columbus. Columbus Dispatch

Elizabeth Hasselbeck introduces Governor Palin

This takes 11 minutes but is well worth watching. The writer at the LA Times just couldn't stop editorializing with alarm quotation marks and snarky remarks either about Hasselbeck or Palin.

"The View" co-host Elisabeth Hasselbeck was incredibly "honored" to introduce Gov. Sarah Palin on Sunday at a Republican rally in Florida.

But she was even more excited about being able to "talk for a full five minutes without being interrupted."

She talked about Palin's women's rights views: equal pay for equal work, putting an end to honor killings, aiding women exploited in the sex trade and stopping the sanctioning of the abortion of unborn daughters in other countries. [this is a misquote: she said of a country's unborn daughters]

She decried the fact that "they" [clarification, the main stream media reporters] are "fixated on her wardrobe," calling it a double standard and deliberately sexist. But then she turned to Palin and remarked admiringly that the governor "sure is a woman who knows how to dress," which got some rather sexist whoops, hollers and whistles from the audience.

Hasselbeck added: "I’m most impressed by her accessories, you know, like the flag pin she wears in honor of her son and our military — men and women — fighting abroad. And they fight for our every [very] right to be here today." ["They didn't list this because they know it's priceless" Hasselbeck said--to which the crowd went wild with USA chants.]

Elisabeth was certainly coming on strong for Palin, sounding much like a lipstick-wearing pit bull/hockey mom herself.

There wasn't a thing threatening or pit-bullish in the entire 11 minutes. Get a grip--it was a campaign speech introduction. Would you rather she get shouted down as her View sisters do? I watched it twice, including the part about McCain paying the women on his staff the same as men, and Obama paying 83 cents on the dollar. LAT Blogger Dishrag forgot to remember that part. Oh, and the writer was just soooo concerned that baby Trig was on stage--now, abortion of a disabled child she would support, because that's a woman's right, but putting him on stage with his mom, dad and sister? Ooooo, now that's cruel says Elizabeth Snead. If you don't kill them, you should at least hide them, I suppose.

A Charter of Negative Liberties--Our Constitution

Redistribution through the courts--"I'm not optimistic." You can craft a rationale bringing economic change through the courts--the 3 of us sitting here could do it.

Warren Court wasn't radical--didn't break free from constraints of the Founding Fathers. The court didn't say what the federal government must do for you on your behalf. [paraphrased based on listening while scratching my head in disbelief]



People who have attended law school in the last 15-20 years probably will not find anything strange in this radio address, just like people listening to Jeremiah Wright for years didn't notice anything--just sounds normal and patriotic to them. This type of unAmerican, radical thinking is so common among certain classes, they are baffled when Conservatives find it alarming.

America's favorite Terrorist has new book

Bill Ayers, Barack's mentor and Chicago backer has a new book. I'm sure I'll have no problem finding it--given its track record my public library will flood the shelves with copies. Here's what Charming Billy bakes in his pie laced with hate for our culture and government (i.e. white Americans--a group of which he is a member, a descendant of generations of the oppressor class).

"Bill Ayers 'gets it.'* Here's what he understands: One strategy to undermine culture is to discredit its values and history. Of course, reducing American history to a simplistic notion of 'white supremacy' is absurd, but that’s the point. The point is to slowly undermine the confidence of people about the values and history of their own culture so they'll be less willing to defend and protect it. Along the way, you've also created a structure of 'them' (so-called 'white' people, meaning, in this context, people from western and northern Europe) and 'us' (everyone else). This creates internal conflict based on simple, easy to understand qualities like skin color.

"Eventually, the culture becomes so disillusioned and split apart that an organized cadre of leaders can take control and establish a new kind of society – like the Bolsheviks did in 1917, or the National Socialists in 1933, or the followers of Mao in 1949," the forum participant wrote.

More on the book at "Ayers, Dohrn: 'White supremacy' responsible for America's troubles"

*I wonder if this is what Michelle Obama meant in Bexley last week when she said, "Barack gets it." The crowd whooped and cheered.

Clear evidence of fraud

Check out Maggie Thurber's blog for more information

So we've got clear evidence of individuals who have come to Ohio on a temporary basis, have no intention of staying in the state past the election and its certification, who have homes and families in other states, who have registered and who have cast a ballot. Today, the boards of elections start separating the ballot envelope from the identification envelope, which means that after separated, these individuals can still be prosecuted for voting illegally, but there is no way to separate out their vote and not have it count. Thurber's Thoughts

The sale of National City, pt.2

I'm still looking for my last dividend check--the one for thirty two cents. The top three executives will get golden parachutes with a combined value of $40 million following the sale (adjusting I assume for the current value of the stock which must not be too terrific); Peter Raskind, Daniel J. Frate, John L. Garney.

Ohio's progressives, socialists and marxists will scream about greed and the failure of capitalism, but I won't. I owned a few shares for about 30 years and did nothing except open the envelope four times a year, endorse the dividend check, and take it to the bank. It was never huge--probably not more than $30-$50 a year, but it was more than the cost of gasoline to drive to the bank, which the most recent one wasn't.

Meanwhile, they were being paid big bucks to figure out how to manage demands that they live up to the crazy expectations of the law and regulations to loan easy money to people who may not be able to pay it back. A law, the Community Reinvestment Act, which started small and quietly during the 1970s, with good intentions. People whose homes may never appreciate, but may depreciate, to fund builders and city services which also jumped into "the American dream" bubble. Easy money--that's what government tampering with the banks and credit did for us. Even churches got into the act, although I don't think they did the political advocacy of the left wing, ACORN type organizations. They too set up corporations, hired people, fixed up homes, "stabilizing neighborhoods," "strengthening community," to help the poor, everyone from Mennonites, to Catholics to Lutherans. But they did it with government money so they'd qualify for loans.

"The Clinton administration has turned the Community Reinvestment Act, a once-obscure and lightly enforced banking regulation law, into one of the most powerful mandates shaping American cities—and, as Senate Banking Committee chairman Phil Gramm memorably put it, a vast extortion scheme against the nation's banks. Under its provisions, U.S. banks have committed nearly $1 trillion for inner-city and low-income mortgages and real estate development projects, most of it funneled through a nationwide network of left-wing community groups, intent, in some cases, on teaching their low-income clients that the financial system is their enemy and, implicitly, that government, rather than their own striving, is the key to their well-being." "The Trillion-Dollar Bank Shakedown That Bodes Ill for Cities," City Journal, Winter 2000

So yes, they were greedy, but when you try to strangle a business, any business, with regulations while also demanding that it perform as a sugar daddy social worker for the poor and low income, you just might find them looking for loop holes to outsmart those guys who float in and out of the beltway, who lobby, and populate endless think tanks.

It's Congress that I'd like to drop from a plane without a parachute, golden or otherwise. It was a stupid affirmative action scheme even back during the Clinton years, but there was time to remedy it. (Bruce Marks , primary culprit--story from 2004) Bush couldn't pull his people together when he had a Republican Congress, and the Democrat Congress blocked any effort, even those late ones, to fix the problem. If Gore had won in 2000, we'd be in exactly the same spot. Had you thought of that? We'd probably gone to war since the whole WMD meme started in the 90s with the Democrats, but even if we hadn't, the economic system still would have failed because the same policies chasing the same easy credit would have been there.

Now we're in a recession, and about to do the Hoover-Roosevelt two step all over again, only this time it will be Bush-Obama. Let's hope it won't take a decade of more tampering and 25% unemployment this time.